e. The debt works
out, as I have shown, at something under L2 per head of the
population, and that population is steadily increasing. That Japan is
well able to pay the interest on her debt there can be no question
whatever, and that when the present debt becomes due for redemption
she will be able to raise the necessary funds for that purpose on
terms even more favourable than those at which she has hitherto placed
her loans I am confident. I must emphasise the fact, since so many
persons seem to be oblivious of it, that this is no mushroom South
American Republic borrowing money merely for the purpose of spending
it on very unproductive and occasionally very doubtful objects, but a
Great World Power sensible of its obligations, sensible likewise of
the policy and necessity of maintaining the national credit, and
confident that the national resources and the patriotism of its people
will enable it not only to bear the present financial burdens but even
greater, should these be found necessary for the defence of the
country or for its development.

The ability of a nation as of an individual to discharge its debts
depends of course upon its resources. No man possessing even a
perfunctory knowledge of the resources of Japan would surely venture
to express alarm at the increase in her debt and scepticism as to her
being able to meet the annual interest on that debt as well as the
constantly increasing expenses of administration. The resources of the
country have, in my opinion, as yet scarcely been realised, and
certainly have not been anything like fully developed. And when I use
the word resources I do not employ it as it is so often employed in
respect of minerals, although the mineral wealth of Japan is
considerable. Her resources, as I estimate them, are to be found in
her large and rapidly increasing population--a population perhaps the
most industrious in the world, persevering, enterprising, methodical,
and performing, whatever be its appointed task, that task with all its
might as a labour of love, in fact, not as the irksome toil of the
worker who is a worker simply because he can be nothing else. It is
this great industrial hive which in the near future will supply China
and other Eastern countries with all, or nearly all, those articles
they now obtain elsewhere. What I may term the European industries of
Japan have of recent years been largely developed or evolved. Take,
for example, an item, insignificant i